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THE PEACE OF PARIS 1919

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THE PEACE OF PARIS 1919

PARIS PEACE CONFERENCE

Organized by the victors at the end of World War I to settle the issues raised by the conflict. Seventy representatives from 27 nations attended. The conference convened on January 18, 1919 at Versailles. Germany, the other defeated Central Powers, and the new Russian Soviet republic did not sit at the conference tables.

BIG FOUR

Dominated the proceedings.

Georges Clemenceau of France,

Woodrow Wilson of the United States,

David Lloyd George of Great Britain

Vittorio Orlando of Italy.

SOBERING STATISTICS

Never far from the memory of both victors and losers was the total of deaths among their soldiers most of whom were young and represented the promise of their nations, now lost for all time.

1. France 1,500,000

2. British Empire1,000,000

3. Russia1,700,000

4. Italy 500,000

5. United States 116,708

6. Germany2,000,000

7. Austria-Hungary1,250,000

CONFLICTING GOALS

1. Wilson favored a conciliatory settlement based on the liberal principles of his Fourteen Points. His chief aim was the establishment of the League of Nations.

CONFLICTING GOALS

2. Clemenceau, a tough, determined, and skillful politician, was determined to avenge the ruin of France and the loss of a generation of French men. He could personally remember the harsh peace terms that Germany had imposed on his country after the Franco-Prussian War. He was determined that Germany should suffer and that the peace terms should make it impossible for Germany to wage war ever again. His chief aim was to secure his country against future German attack.

CONFLICTING GOALS

3. Lloyd George was inclined to make a practical: moderate peace, he had been elected on the basis of promises that Germany and its war leaders would be punished. He distrusted Wilson's idealism and was determined that none of the Fourteen Points should be allowed to interfere with Britain, its traditional policies: or its commitments to others.

CONFLICTING GOALS

4. Orlando, the least important of the Big four, was determined that Italy receive the huge territorial rewards that had been promised in 1915 to lure Italy into the war on the Allied side.

FRENCH CONCESSIONS

France conceded its key demand, that the left bank of the Rhine be detached from Germany and put under French military control, in exchange for British and American promises of future support. These promises were later repudiated.

FOURTEEN POINTS

1) open covenants of peace;

2) freedom of the seas;

3) removal of trade barriers;

4) reduction of national armaments;

5) adjustment of colonial claims with the interests of the people given equal consideration;

6) Russian territorial integrity and acceptance into the society of free nations;

7) restoration of Belgian sovereignty;

FOURTEEN POINTS

8) restoration of French territory;

9) Italy's boundaries should be adjusted along lines of nationality;

10) the autonomous development of Austria-Hungary;

11) political and economic independence for the Balkan states;

12) Turkish sovereignty and autonomous development for the nationalities formerly under Ottoman control; free passage through the Dardanelles;

13) an independent Poland with access to the sea;

14) a general association of nations to insure the political independence and territorial integrity of all states.

SECRET TREATIES

gain support countries had made treaties during the war promising compensation for war efforts to those who joined their side.

A. March, 1915: England and France promised Russia Constantinople, the Straits, and the bordering areas as long as they were open to travel

SECRET TREATIES

B. April, 1915, Augusta 1916: Allies promised territories to Italy and Rumania if they joined the Allied cause.

C. April, 1916: England and France promised one another spheres in Mesopotamia and Palestine as well as Syria, Adana, Cilia, and southern Kurdistan.

SECRET TREATIES

D. May, 1915: Sykes-Picot Treaty defined the Arabian spheres of France and Britain. Russia was to have similar rights in Armenia, portions of Kurdistan, northeastern Anatolia.

2) France and Russia agreed to promote one another's claims at a future peace conference.

3) Arab independence was promised.

4) A Jewish homeland was promised.

TREATY OF VERSAILLES

Presented to Germany in May 1919 and signed on June 28, was, however, still criticized as a harsh ''dictated peace."

Hands off German Lands

TREATY OF VERSAILLES

A. Germany was compelled to admit war guilt and to pay heavy reparations ($33 billion). Germany was to pay for all civilian damages caused during the war. The former emperor and other unspecified German war leaders were to be tried as war criminals. (This provision was never enforced.)

TREATY OF VERSAILLES

B. The German army was limited to 100,000 soldiers and was not to possess any heavy artillery, the general staff was abolished, and the navy was to be reduced. No air force would be permitted, and the production of military planes was forbidden.

TREATY OF VERSAILLES

C. German colonies became mandates of Allied countries. Britain and France divided most of Germany's African colonies, and Japan took over the extensive island possessions in the South Pacific.

TREATY OF VERSAILLES

D. Alsace-Lorraine was returned to France. The Saar coal mines came under French control.

TREATY OF VERSAILLES

E. Allied occupation of the Rhineland was to continue for at least 15 years, and possibly longer, and the region was to remain perpetually demilitarized, as was a belt of territory 30 miles deep along the right bank of the Rhine

TREATY OF VERSAILLES

F. Three smaller frontier regions near Eupen and Malmedy were to be ceded to Belgium.

TREATY OF VERSAILLES

G. Parts of the German provinces of Posen and West Prussia were to be given to Poland to provide that revived nation with access to the Baltic Sea; the Baltic seaport of Gdansk (Danzig) was to become a free state but linked economically to Poland. This Polish Corridor to the Baltic left East Prussia completely separated from the rest of Germany.

TREATY OF VERSAILLESRESPONSES

H. German Response: On May 7 a German delegation headed by Graf Ulrich von Brockdorff-Rantzau were presented with the treaty terms which Brockdorff-Rantzau denounced. He reminded the Allied leaders that the Fourteen Points had provided the basis for the armistice negotiations and thus were as binding on the Allies as on Germany. He insisted that the economic provisions of the treaty were impossible to fulfill. Although refusing to sign the treaty, the German delegation took it back to Berlin where Chancellor Philipp Scheidemann also denounced the treaty.

TREATY OF VERSAILLESRESPONSES

The Allies had maintained their naval blockade of Germany, however, and after long and bitter debates in Berlin, it became obvious that Germany had no choice but to sign the treaty. Scheidemann and Brockdorff-Rantzau resigned on June 21. That same day, at Scapa Flow, the German High Seas Fleet staged a dramatic protest. Despite every conceivable British precaution, the German sailors scuttled each of their 50 warships in the harbor. On June 28, 1919 the new German chancellor, Gustav Bauer, sent another delegation to Versailles. After informing the Allies that Germany was accepting the treaty only because of the need to alleviate the hardships on its people caused by the ''inhuman'' blockade, the Germans signed.

TREATY OF VERSAILLESRESPONSES

I. American Response: Led by Henry Cabot Lodge, the Irreconcilables in the U.S. Senate defeated the treaty in November, 1919 in spite of Wilson's whistle-stop tour of the U.S. to garner support. The United States made a separate treaty with Germany in 1921.

LEAGUE OF NATIONS

(approved April 28, 1919, inaugurated January 15, 1920 at the completion of the Conference): 63 nations were members including all the major European powers at one time or another. Its headquarters were in Geneva.

LEAGUE OF NATIONS

A. Purpose: To make the peace secure, administer former colonies of the defeated powers as mandates, and foster general disarmament

B. Structure: Council of five permanent members and elected delegates from smaller nations, an assembly, a World Court.

LEAGUE OF NATIONS

D. COVENANT OF THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS: An integral part of the treaty, and every nation signing the treaty had to accept the world organization.

TREATY OF SAINT GERMAIN

Signed with Austria September 10, 1919. Austria recognized the independence of Czechoslovakia, Poland, Hungary and Yugoslavia. it also recognized the award of Galacia to Poland, and of the Trentino, South Tyrol, Trieste and Istria to Italy. The Austrian army was limited to 30,000 men, and Austria agreed to pay economic reparations to Allied nations that had been victims of Austro-Hungarian aggression. Austria was forbidden to unite with Germany.

TREATY OF NEUILLY

Signed with Bulgaria November 27, 1919. Bulgaria recognized the independence of Yugoslavia, and agreed to cede territory to Yugoslavia, Romania, and Greece. Bulgaria's army was restricted, and the country was forced to pay reparations to its Allied neighbors.

TREATY OF TRIANON

Signed with Hungary on June 4, 1920. It reduced the country in area from 109,000 sq mi. to less than 36,000 sq mi. The Hungarian army was limited to 35,000 troops, and reparations were demanded, although the amount was unspecified

TREATY OF SEVRES

The peace settlement with Turkey was long delayed.

When finally signed on August 10, l920--it was somewhat meaningless, because Turkish strongman Mustafa Kemal Pasha was leading a nationalist movement and establishing a powerful government. After reconquering Turkish Armenia, which had become independent, and after ejecting a Greek army from Turkey in a brilliant campaign, Mustafa Kemal reoccupied Thrace, or European Turkey, which had been given to Greece by the Treaty of Sevres.

TREATY OF SEVRES

He then informed the Allies that he was willing to accept most of the other provisions of the original peace settlement, consistent with the Fourteen Points. The Allies having no desire for a new war, and accepting the reasonableness of the Turkish position, agreed.

TREATY OF LAUSANNE

Signed with Turkey on July 24, 1923. Turkey recognized the independence of the Arab Kingdom of Hejaz, the French mandate over Syria, and the British mandates over Palestine and Mesopotamia. Turkey also recognized Greek and Italian occupation of most of its former Aegean islands and agreed to demilitarize the straits, retaining the right to close them in time of war. Turkey was to pay no reparations. It was a fair and responsible treaty that left Turkey better off than it had been before the war, because all of the territories lost were really non-Turkish and had been perpetual military and economic problems for the old empire.